Bedeviled by a coding bug
I vow with all beings
to expose and see clearly
an underbelly of desires.
I started down this route of composing gathas because — no surprise — neither Thich Nhat Hanh nor Roshi Robert Aiken has much to say about computers, let alone programming them. My hope is to create a set of verses to turn to whenever computer-related crazy-making mindstates arise.
The most recent such mindstate involves an include file that doesn’t seem to be responding on my localhost. All’s well in production and nothing appears to be wrong in development, but I can’t update one line of code, I can’t figure out why, and, most concerning, this preoccupies me as I do other things. It’s a common pattern.
The good news, however uncomfortable, is that I noticed. So, in an effort to extricate myself, I did Master Guo Gu’s “Fourfold Process” to cultivate right attitudes.* Attitudes. That’s it right there.
The process is as follows:
- Expose. What’s really going on?
- Embrace. Accept. These negative patterns “may have been part of our defense mechanisms and survival skills.”
- Transform – take responsibility and work through.
- Let go – no longer under the influence.
I won’t bother you with the particulars, but the bottom line is I was able to release it. For now. I have no doubt I’ll need to rinse and repeat many times.
* Guo Gu. Silent Illumination: A Chan Buddhist Path to Natural Awakening. Shambala, 2021. Pages 21-22.